At Last - Validation

During our college years, one of mine and jedi jawa's biggest pop culture pet peeves was Alanis Morissette's "Ironic," which described a series of situations that were anything but. When she asked, "isn't it ironic?", we'd inevitably scream back, "NO!"

So, I'm pleased, after all these years, to find some validation in that opinion, via this post to the New York Times Paper Cuts blog about defining irony:

Alanis Morissette’s song “Ironic” is equally useful. If it rains on your wedding day, that’s a coincidence, not an irony. If you win the lottery and drop dead before claiming the money, it’s good luck followed by bad luck. If you meet the man of your dreams and then meet his beautiful wife, it’s a bummer. But if a song called “Ironic” contains no irony, is that in itself ironic? Nope.

It may just be … dumb. It depends on the creator’s intent. So, as has been suggested, if Morissette purposely wrote a song called “Ironic” that contained no irony at all, is that ironic? We may be getting closer. Do you know irony when you see it?

I've got nothing against Alanis - she is God, after all - but she did contribute one of the more vapid bits of 90s pop culture with that gem.